Wind-farm-design software refines uncertainty and loss estimates

OpenWind Enterprise software is wind-farm design and optimization software based on the open source version of openWind.

A renewable-energy-consulting and information firm has released openWind Enterprise 1.3, software that further refines the wind farm design process with improved loss and uncertainty estimates. In addition to an ability to optimize for cost of energy and assess deep array impacts, current Enterprise users will receive Time-Series Energy Capture and Effective Turbulence Intensity upgrades, along with a pilot of Time-Scheduling of Turbines. These features help developers trim time off projects and meet requirements of utilities and turbine manufacturers. “This is just the first stage of an ongoing rollout of new features aimed at addressing the real needs of wind farm design,” said Nick Robinson, Director of openWind. “This new release lets clients gain more insight in the design phase of their wind farm.” A few features include:

Effective turbulence intensity provides a measure of fatigue loading on each turbine due to ambient and wake-induced turbulence. Users can calculate effective turbulence values according to the latest amendment to IEC614000-1 (ed. 3), and specify how wakes are modeled.

Times-series energy capture lets users assess diurnal and seasonal impacts of turbulence intensity and air density as well as temperature variance shutdown losses. By inserting the time-element back into the energy capture analysis, users more easily see the effects of summer and winter differences as well as different daytime and nighttime stability regimes.

Time scheduling of turbines letsusers switch off individual turbines by time of day or year and switch individual turbines to a different power curve. This is particularly useful when attempting to quantify the impact of grid curtailment. For example, switching to low-noise power curves at night to meet local regulations or switching off a turbine for specific times of day when shadow flicker may be a problem.

OpenWind Enterprise software is wind-farm design and optimization software based on the open source version of openWind. There are over 3,500 users of the free community version of openWind. The openWind Enterprise version was developed for wind developers who need more powerful features, an industry-leading geographical information systems (GIS) interface, the ability to optimize for cost of energy, assess deep array impacts, and define and analyze strategies for managed shut-down of turbines.